Getting people to park their bicycles in racks

A large proportion of the staff, visitors, patients and medical students come to the UMCG hospital by bicycle and they need to be able to park their bikes securely. “The Riksja shelters are almost too popular. They are often completely full!”

The UMCG is one of the largest hospitals in the Netherlands and the largest employer in the northern region of the Netherlands. In January 2012, the UMCG introduced a bicycle parking policy. The objective is to get people to park their bicycles in the racks provided. After all, the hospital site needs to be kept secure, accessible and tidy. As such, bicycles should not be parked on pavements and enough bicycle racks should be provided.

The number of bicycle parking spaces has therefore been increased to more than 7000. Particular effort has been made to ensure that the parking facilities look uniform and are convenient for users of bicycles, mopeds and motorcyclists.

The various bicycle parking facilities are spread over the extensive site as much as possible, to take account of the routes taken by the target groups. For patients, there is a bicycle parking area very close to the main entrance of the hospital, so they can park quickly and do not have to walk far. Employees can leave their bicycles by the side entrance, for instance, in a large underground bicycle parking area with access control at the entrance. Thanks to the dual-level Easylift+ bicycle parking system in this bicycle park, there are now almost twice as many bicycle parking spaces.

“Working with both the account manager Danny Douwes and the project leader during the installation of the bicycle racks, everything went very smoothly”, according to Monique Hillebrand, senior staff member at UMCG facility Management.